Stockton University’s Sara and Sam Schoffer Holocaust Resource Center has been selected as the exclusive New Jersey partner for the Auschwitz Legacy Fellowship.
The fully funded program will send six of the state’s high school teachers to Poland next summer to visit the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum. The New Jersey fellowships are part of the foundation’s goal of funding 500 teachers in all 50 states.
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation developed the fellowship and pays for and runs it. Stockton’s center is working with the foundation and the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education to bring it to the state.
Irvin Moreno-Rodriguez, Director of the Holocaust Resource Center, said the choice reflects the center’s reputation.
“We are proud that we are the exclusive Holocaust Resource Center partner site for the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation to bring the Auschwitz Legacy Fellowship here to New Jersey,” he said. “Our selection speaks to the caliber and the quality of the work that we do in New Jersey and across the country.”
Stockton has long been a leader in Holocaust education, including the establishment of a lecture series and a scholarship fund.
The fellowship lasts a year. Teachers take six online sessions from January to June on Holocaust history and antisemitism, including conversations with survivors and historians. They also get special access to the museum’s remote guided visits for their students, along with lesson plans and other materials to use alongside what Stockton’s center already provides.
The year ends with a weeklong trip to Warsaw, Krakow and Auschwitz-Birkenau, with walking tours, seminars led by experts and a deep look at Jewish history and heritage in Poland.
Moreno-Rodriguez said seeing the camp in person is the heart of the program.
“I’m a big believer that to understand the history of the Holocaust, we have to understand space, place, location and geography,” he said. “Seeing the scale of the camp really brings it home for a lot of the students, educators and community members that we take to Auschwitz. To realize how vast this murder was, and this complicated system that the Nazis built, it becomes a very emotional journey. And it can give you that energy and drive to continue teaching this for generations to come.”
Applications are open through Nov. 15. Applicants must never have visited Auschwitz-Birkenau and must plan to keep teaching for at least five more years.
Maria Zalewska-Glezer, Executive Director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation, said the fellows become part of something larger.
“By joining the Auschwitz Legacy Fellowship, teachers become part of a national network of passionate educators committed to memory, truth and civic responsibility,” she said. “Together, we are helping the next generation understand not only what the Holocaust was, but how and why it happened and what its lessons mean for the world today.”
